


Kishotenketsu

by Fig Newton (sg_fignewton)



Category: Stargate (1994), Stargate SG-1
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Introspection, Jack pov, at the beginning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 09:37:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18008456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sg_fignewton/pseuds/Fig%20Newton
Summary: Jack does a little reflecting on how his understanding of the universe has changed sinceStargate: the Movie. A direct lead-in to Jack's first appearance inCOTG.





	Kishotenketsu

**Author's Note:**

> Written in May 2014 as a backup fic for Episode Alphabet Soup, and a fill of a bingo square.

_ Kishotenketsu: a story based on observing how change affects perception, rather than classical conflict plotlines _

Jack hauled himself up the last few steps of the ladder and onto the roof. Straightening, he stretched until he felt his spine crack. 

As usual, no traffic came through the quiet neighborhood street, allowing him to revel in the silence. He blew out a long, slow breath and watched the vapor dissipate into the chilly air. Everything was normal. Familiar. Ordinary. It was just another night of sharing the stars with his telescope and a bottle of beer, as he'd done every cloudless night for a year now.

Except it wasn't. Nothing was ever going to be the same, was it? 

It wasn't the obvious changes in his life that made the difference. Not his retirement from the military, not -

( _Charlie_ )

\- not the loss of his son, not the divorce papers he'd found on the table when he'd come home. He'd dealt with that -

( _or not dealt with it permanently, as he'd come too close to doing_ )

\- dealt with that in his own way, and once he'd successfully moved past certain... tendencies, Jack was pretty sure he'd reacted more or less as he'd always done.

Jack dragged a clean rag out of his pocket and wiped the eyepiece of his telescope free of dust. He'd had time enough, before West hustled them out of the mountain a year ago, to do a little research: Abydos' sun wasn't visible from Earth. His stargazing wouldn't change because of his new knowledge that there was another planet out there with human beings who had been brought there from Earth by an alien with delusions of grandeur and an eyeliner fetish. His awareness of an amazing, courageous group of people who had cast off the belief of millennia to rebel - to save his life, and the lives of his men, and throw down their false god - none of that had to change how he looked at the night sky, did it?

Knowing that a scruffy civilian had died to spare him and had _come back to life_ , had chosen to stay behind with a new people and a new wife and the joy of the opened universe reflected in his eyes...

Jack huffed again, a self-deprecating chuckle that only the crickets might overhear.

Oh, who was he kidding?

It didn't matter if the door had been slammed shut, carefully buried behind them. He _knew_ that there was life beyond Earth now, and he'd never look at the stars the same way again.

"Hope you're getting some good stargazing in with Shau'ri, Daniel," he murmured to the soft night, and grinned to himself. "Among other things."

He bent over the eyepiece. There was a slight scuffling on the ladder, but Jack chose to ignore it.


End file.
